4 out of 5

Label: Hypercolour Records

Produced by: Ed DMX

Seeded into DMX Krew’s very accessible Glad to be Sad LP is the idea of something a bit more layered: the album itself is sandwiched between a bouncy opening groove and a way goofy, 80s synthfest closer – nine tracks of minimalist electro or pretty caustic acid – while both the artwork and title of the release have juxtaposed elements: the former’s simple graphical style used in chaotic effect; the latter pairing opposite emotional states. It’s a weird album, but it’s also full of non-stop bops because… it’s Ed.

Glad to Be Sad’s sides trade off a little bit in terms of focus, though the overall flow cycles between industrial squelch and pared-down ambient workouts, generally using some more laid back tracks to separate out the harder ones. “Harder” is relative, though: I do want to underline how much of a comprehensively enjoyable album this is, which is true of most of Ed’s long players, but especially the Hypercolour ones, which tend to strike a balance between kitschy analog cheek and “awareness” of album and song structure; i.e. these feel designed for listening and not directly the club, and are also generalized enough, stylistically, to be unable to pigeonhole the sound one way or another. Glad pushes this trend along fascinatingly, embellishing and abstracting at the same time, which does have the effect of making the release simultaneously awesome and… repetitive, as some tracks don’t move much beyond their initial beat. What’s interesting about that, though, is that these tend to be the shorter songs, meaning that somehow the shorter tunes feel longer than the actual longer ones, which plays in to the whole boodle of dichotomies presented here.

I recognize I am (often) reading more into this than necessary, but the album has something of a cinematic intro, which seems overly grandiose for what might be dismissible as “standard” DMX acid and is rather an odd move for Ed besides; all to say that I do think there’s a different picture being painted… though it’s like the altered picture that emerges by going over the same lines multiple times.

Reading back over this, this might be one of my most nonsense reviews yet, where I’ve not said much of anything. That was, indeed, my struggle when listening: really, really enjoying the album, but curiously unable to crack its sound. More simply, you have two kitsch DMX Krew tunes surrounding an album’s worth of solid acid that leans either harsh or mellow. If you’re a fan of any of Ed’s Hypercolour work from this same era, you should already be sold, but I think this one has even longer legs – it’s wide enough for mass appeal to electro fans; nuanced enough to give longtime fans like me curiosities to mull over.